Health and Health Care

RAND advances understanding of health and health behaviors and examines how the organization and financing of care affect costs, quality, and access. RAND's body of research—conducted primarily through the RAND Health division—includes innovative studies of health insurance, health care reform, health information technology, and women's health, as well as topical concerns such as obesity, complementary and alternative medicine, and PTSD in veterans and survivors of catastrophe.

Research conducted by: RAND Health; Center for Military Health Policy Research; RAND Europe; RAND Drug Policy Research Center; RAND Law, Business, and Regulation; RAND Labor and Population; RAND Gulf States Policy Institute

Featured at RAND

How Will Eliminating the Individual Mandate Affect Health Coverage and Premium Costs?

The individual mandate of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 (ACA) requires that most Americans either obtain health coverage or pay an annual fine. How much will overturning the individual mandate affect costs and coverage?

All Items (6377)

COMMENTARY

Using Patient Surveys to Rate Hospitals — Mar 22, 2012

Hospitals that perform better on the survey tend to do better on clinical measures, have fewer readmissions within 30 days and have lower risk-adjusted mortality, write Marc Elliott and Alan Zaslavsky.

COMMENTARY

What Happens Without the Individual Mandate? — Mar 21, 2012

If the individual mandate were ruled unconstitutional, subsidies and the age structure of premiums should keep enough healthy people in the insurance exchanges to prevent huge spikes in premiums, write Carter C. Price and Christine Eibner.

COMMENTARY

Promoting Success: Using Data to Inform Decision Making — Mar 21, 2012

Many organizations that we have worked with indicate that this approach has helped improve reporting and communication both within and external to their organization, writes Sarah Hunter.

RESEARCH BRIEF

Eliminating Discretionary Use of Anesthesia Providers During Gastroenterology Procedures Could Generate $1.1 Billion in Savings per Year — Mar 20, 2012

The use of dedicated anesthesia providers for routine gastroenterology (GI) procedures is seen as medically justifiable only for high-risk patients. Eliminating these services for low-risk patients could generate $1.1 billion in savings per year.

JOURNAL ARTICLE

Use of Anesthesia Providers During Gastroenterology Procedures Has Increased Rapidly, but May Be Unneeded — Mar 20, 2012

The use of dedicated anesthesia providers for routine gastroenterology (GI) procedures is seen as medically justifiable only for high-risk patients. Eliminating these services for low-risk patients could generate $1.1 billion in savings per year.

NEWS RELEASE

Use of Anesthesia Providers During Gastroenterology Procedures Has Increased Rapidly, but May Be Unneeded — Mar 20, 2012

Use of anesthesia providers to monitor sedation during screening colonoscopies and other outpatient gastroenterology procedures more than doubled from 2003 to 2009 in the United States, with most of the increase among low-risk patients who may not need this service.

REPORT

A Matrix of New Media Use Measures and Brief Media Survey — Mar 19, 2012

There is a lack of data that address new media use and its potential relationship with adolescent sexual risk behavior and sexual health. The authors developed this matrix of measures to summarize the state of measurement in this arena and set the stage for further research. The measures were extracted from studies of media use, media effects, and interventions that employ new media to improve sexual health. Several new items are also…

NEWS RELEASE

Web-Based Tool for Parents of Children with Flu-Like Symptoms Piloted at DC-Area Hospitals — Mar 15, 2012

Researchers from the RAND Corporation and other institutions have begun pilot-testing a web-based tool designed to help parents and adult caregivers determine whether to seek urgent medical attention for a sick child with flu-like symptoms.

REPORT

Compensation for Combat Deaths: Policy Considerations — Mar 15, 2012

This briefing identifies policy questions related to compensating service members and their survivors for fatality risk. After comparing patterns in the characteristics of combat fatalities with those of fatalities occurring in other contexts, it discusses the Department of Defense's current compensation programs. Policymakers may benefit from both empirical studies and comparisons with compensation programs that exist in other contexts.

PROJECT

Can Employer Accommodation Reduce Disability-Related Retirement? — Mar 14, 2012

Employment trajectories following the onset of disability are poorly understood. Employer-focused policy interventions may reduce uptake in public disability insurance and disability-induced early retirement.

PROJECT

Will Health Care Reform Impact Applications for Disability Benefits? — Mar 12, 2012

As the Affordable Care Act expands health insurance coverage in the U.S., the "cost" of applying for SSDI will decline for many. Studying the effect of Massachusetts health care reform in 2006 may provide insights into the impact the ACA may have on SSDI applications and awards.

REPORT

The National Institute for Health Research Leadership Programme: An evaluation of programme progress and delivery — Mar 8, 2012

RAND Europe evaluated the National Institute for Health Research Leadership Programme to help the English Department of Health consider the extent to which the programme has helped to foster wider research aims and extract lessons for the future.

JOURNAL ARTICLE

Ways to Improve Health Care Provider 'Report Cards' — Mar 5, 2012

As health care reform expands the use of "report cards" to grade health care providers, greater attention to reporting methods may be needed to assure the quality of such efforts.

NEWS RELEASE

Ways to Improve Health Care Provider 'Report Cards' — Mar 5, 2012

As health care reform expands the use of "report cards" to grade health care providers, greater attention to reporting methods may be needed to assure the quality of such efforts.

COMMENTARY

Military Families: What We Know and What We Don't Know — Mar 2, 2012

Never before in our nation's history have our service members and their families been so challenged and never before have their struggles (and successes) been the topic of so much scholarly attention, writes Sarah O. Meadows.

JOURNAL ARTICLE

Rasch Analysis in the Development of a Simplified Version of the National Eye Institute Visual-Function Questionnaire-25 for Utility Estimation — Mar 1, 2012

This study developed a vision-targeted health state classification system based on the National Eye Institute Visual Function Questionnaire-25 (NEI VFQ-25).

JOURNAL ARTICLE

Development of a Prognostic Model for Six-Month Mortality in Older Adults with Declining Health — Mar 1, 2012

This study seeks to develop a new prognostic model, the Patient-Reported Outcome Mortality Prediction Tool (PROMPT), for six-month mortality in community-dwelling elderly patients.

JOURNAL ARTICLE

Do Small-Group Health Insurance Regulations Influence Small Business Size? — Mar 1, 2012

State small-group health insurance reforms, implemented in the 1990s, aimed at controlling the variability of health insurance premiums and to improve access to health insurance. These reforms only affected firms within a specific size range, and as a result, they may have affected the size of small firms around the legislative threshold and may also have affected the propensity of small firms to offer health insurance.

JOURNAL ARTICLE

Are There Differences in the Medicare Experiences of Beneficiaries in Puerto Rico Compared with Those in the U.S. Mainland? — Mar 1, 2012

The authors compare the experiences of elderly Medicare beneficiaries in Puerto Rico with their English-preferring and Spanish-preferring Medicare counterparts in the U.S. mainland.

JOURNAL ARTICLE

Assessing Relationships Between State and Local Public Health Organizations: Evidence from the NACCHO 2008 Profile of Local Health Departments — Mar 1, 2012

The authors analyze data from the 2008 National Association of City and County Health Officials Profile of Local Health Departments survey, and propose an improved composite measure of centralization that can be computed for all local health departments within a state, as opposed to a single state respondent, as done in 1998.

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